WASHINGTON - Some Democrats say they never approved a domestic wiretapping program, undermining suggestions by President Bush and his senior advisers that the plan was fully vetted in a series of congressional briefings.

"I feel unable to fully evaluate, much less endorse, these activities," West Virginia Sen. Jay Rockefeller, the Senate Intelligence Committee's top Democrat, said in a handwritten letter to Vice President Dick Cheney in July 2003.

I am writing to reiterate my concern regarding the sensitive intelligence issues we discussed today with the DCI, DIRNSA, and Chairman Roberts and our House Intelligence Committee counterparts.

Clearly the activities we discussed raise profound oversight issues.

As you know, I am neither a technician or an attorney. Given the security restrictions associated with this information, and my inability to consult staff or counsel on my own, I feel unable to fully evaluate, much less endorse these activities.

As I reflected on the meeting today, and the future we face, John Poindexter's TIA project sprung to mind, exacerbating my concern regarding the direction the Administration is moving with regard to security, technology, and surveiliance.

Without more information and the ability to draw on any independent legal or techical expertise, I simply cannot satisfy lingering concerns raised by the briefing we received.

I am retaining a copy of this letter in a sealed envelope in the secure spaces of the Senate Intelligence Committee to ensure that I have a record of this communication.

I appreciate your consideration of my views.

Most respectfully,

Jay Rockefeller

Chilling. Absolutely chilling.

Sen. Rockefeller was obviously covering his butt because he knew that something about the Neo-Con plan was, uh, not quite right. Something that reminded him of John Poindexter's "Total Information Awareness" project.

Because Sen. Rockefeller - the great-grandson of oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller and nephew of former U.S. Vice President Nelson A. Rockefeller - knows a thing or two about the machinations of power.

Capice?

GREAT GRANDPA WAS ONE OF THE MOST POWERFUL PEOPLE EVER!

Aaaggghhh!!!

(I'll come back to John Poindexter in a bit.)

Rockefeller is among a small group of congressional leaders who have received briefings on the administration's four-year-old program to eavesdrop — without warrants — on international calls and e-mails of Americans and others inside the United States with suspected ties to al-Qaida.

The government still would seek court approval to snoop on purely domestic communications, such as calls between New York and Los Angeles.

Some legal experts described the program as groundbreaking. And until the highly classified program was disclosed last week, those in Congress with concerns about the National Security Agency spying on Americans raised them only privately.

After the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, John Ashcroft, who was then attorney general, loosened restrictions on the F.B.I.'s investigative powers, giving the bureau greater ability to visit and monitor Web sites, mosques and other public entities in developing terrorism leads.

The bureau has used that authority to investigate not only groups with suspected ties to foreign terrorists, but also protest groups suspected of having links to violent or disruptive activities.

But the documents, coming after the Bush administration's confirmation that President Bush had authorized some spying without warrants in fighting terrorism, prompted charges from civil rights advocates that the government had improperly blurred the line between terrorism and acts of civil disobedience and lawful protest.

One F.B.I. document indicates that agents in Indianapolis planned to conduct surveillance as part of a "Vegan Community Project."

Another document talks of the Catholic Workers group's "semi-communistic ideology."

A third indicates the bureau's interest in determining the location of a protest over llama fur planned by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

No snarky comments. Draw your own conclusions.

Time to return to the first article:

(Bush's) senior aides have stressed the program was narrowly targeted at individuals with a suspected link to al-Qaida or affiliated extremist groups.

And Bush said it was "a shameful act" for someone to have leaked details to the media.

Got that?!

That's a key Republican talking point: It was "a shameful act" for someone to have leaked details to the media...because the evildoers now know that we're, uh, spying on them.

LIKE THEY DIDN'T KNOW THAT ALREADY?!

PLEASE! They've seen "True Lies!"

*

As promised, a quick note on John Poindexter and the "TIA."

This is really cheap, but I'm just gonna post the Wikipedia line on a guy who knows some things about "intelligence":

Admiral John Marlan Poindexter (born August 12, 1936 in Odon, Indiana) is best known as a prominent United States Department of Defense official.

He was a controversial figure in his high profile roles as Deputy National Security Advisor and National Security Advisor for the Reagan administration.

More recently, he served a brief stint as the Director of the DARPA Information Awareness Office for the administration of George W. Bush.

*

Poindexter was convicted on multiple felony counts on April 7, 1990 for conspiracy, obstruction of justice, lying to Congress, defrauding the government, and the alteration and destruction of evidence pertaining to the Iran-Contra Affair.

The convictions were reversed in 1991 on the grounds that the prosecution's evidence may have been tainted by exposure to Poindexter's testimony before the joint House-Senate committee investigating the matter, in which Poindexter's testimony was compelled by a grant of 'use immunity'.

The prosecution was not able to re-try the case.

After that episode, Poindexter joined the "private sector," and went to work on a number of defense related projects.

Like "data collecting" and "information gathering."

From December, 2002, to August, 2003, Poindexter served as the Director of the DARPA Information Awareness Office (IAO).

The IAO has the stated mission to gather as much information as possible about everyone, in a centralized location, for easy perusal by the United States government, including (though not limited to) Internet activity, credit card purchase histories, airline ticket purchases, car rentals, medical records, educational transcripts, driver's licenses, utility bills, tax returns, and any other available data.

In essence, the IAO’s goal is to develop the capacity to recreate a life history of thoughts and movements for any individual on the planet on demand, which some deem necessary to counter the threat of terrorism. Critics claim the very existence of the IAO completely disregards the concept of individual privacy and liberties.

They see the organization as far too invasive and prone to abuse.

*

The integrity of Poindexter as head of the IAO also came under scrutiny, given his conviction on five felony charges for lying to Congress and deliberately altering and destroying documents pertaining to the Iran-Contra Affair, although those convictions were later overturned.

*

DARPA changed the name of the "Total Information Awareness" program to "Terrorist Information Awareness" on May 20, 2003, emphasizing in its report to Congress that the program is not designed to compile dossiers on US citizens, but rather to gather information on terrorist networks.

Despite this name change and reassurance, the description of the program's activities remained essentially the same in the report, and critics continue to see the system as prone to massive Orwellian abuses.

*

A Senate defense appropriations bill passed unanimously on July 18, 2003 explicitly denies any funding to Terrorist Information Awareness research, which will effectively kill the program if implemented.

The Pentagon office that was developing a vast computerized terrorism surveillance system would be closed and no money could be spent to use those high-tech spying tools against Americans on U.S. soil, House and Senate negotiators have agreed on September 25, 2003.

But they left open the possibility that some or all of the high-powered software under development might be employed by different government offices to gather intelligence from U.S. citizens and others abroad or from foreigners in this country.